Widows storm Police HQ over non-payment of pension

[DT]

Hundreds of families mostly widows and children of deceased policemen yesterday besieged the police headquarters in Abuja demanding the payment of their pension benefits.  The protesters stormed the headquarters at about 7 am chanting "give us our cheques."

The number of the protesters swelled between 1,200 and 1,500 by 8 am. Most of them were not happy with  what they described as the lukewarm attitude of the government over their benefits. The unpaid monies covered the period of six years, between 2004 and 2010.

Top police officers led by the Deputy Inspector General in charge of Finance and Administration, Suleiman Fakai, pleaded for peaceful resolution and later summoned a meeting with the representatives of the protesters which lasted for four hours.

One of the protesters said the police recently asked them to come to Abuja for a pension verification exercise in newspaper adverts in July and that they were agitated when they noticed the presence of pension administrators in the exercise. Pension administrators were recently accused of stealing the sum of N32.8 billion from the police pension office in Abuja.

He said sequel to the agreement reached at the meeting, protesters had accepted to complete forms provided by the pension administrators involved in the exercise which will be part of the verification procedure.

Another representative of the protesters, who attended the meeting Friday Ameh, said that they were satisfied with the agreement reached at the meeting as the administrators had dropped some of the difficult conditions hitherto demanded.

The pension managers had demanded a letter of administration by a high court stating the data of the deceased police officers and the police colleges they attended.

Another protester who will not want to be named said their intention was not to cause confusion or interrupt work at the police headquarters but to get their benefits without further hitches.

``We were expecting this money since January but nobody called us until last week. They gave us a date, August 6 and August 7 for interview for the collection of our bank cheques.

"But to our surprise and dismay, as we came yesterday, they engaged two insurance companies, Premium Pensions and Sigma Pensions."

When asked if police have issued an option to resolve the matter, he said ``at this junction, what we need is our cheque and we are not going back until our demand is met."

Fakai told journalists after the meeting that the inability to pay the families on time was due to minor problems which were being addressed.

He said the beneficiaries were invited to Abuja after their respective state commands have failed to make the processes efficient.

``We had a minor problem because the benefits were not paid and now government has released the money through the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

``The pension is for between 2004 and 2010.

Daily Trust